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Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

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Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#141

Post by koodijaba »

KirillPanov wrote: post #92
refurb wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is income tax and income is public in many of these countries.

You've got to be kidding me. Like if I have somebody's name I can just call up their government and ask what their salary is? I find that hard to believe. Please name these countries.

Finland to name one.

"As part of Finland’s celebrated transparency, any member of the public can call up the local tax office to enquire about a total stranger’s annual income and tax contributions." - https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/in_finland_all_it_takes_i...

Also tax and income data for everyone earning over 100 000€ a year will be posted publicly online (with an option to opt-out).

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#142

Post by [deleted] »

Hamuko wrote: post #33
bemmu wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Finland it's "we think you owe X amount of taxes, if you agree, do nothing".

I wonder how many people actually bother claiming their home office as an expense for 2020. It's pretty easy to do (I did it), but the benefit isn't that massive and inaction is easier than action. The standard flat deduction for "work-related expenses" is 750 euro and you can bump that to 900 euro if you worked remotely for >50% of the year's workdays. Of course, if you actually incurred more expenses (and kept trac…

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#143

Post by jessehattabaugh »

vages wrote: post #15

Related fun (and sad) fact: In Norway, the tax submission forms are online and so user friendly that you don't need a tax filing program like this. Edit: Here is a link to an explanation for the form, in English, which was revamped in 2020: https://www.skatteetaten.no/en/person/taxes/tax-return/tax-r... The submission form is essentially a wizard that asks you questions related to your situation and your past year. D…

Truth is taxes in the US are pretty easy too; you just have to find TurboTax's free version which they hide. It downloads info from your financial institutions and employers, and asks you all the relevant questions. It remembers your info from year to year, and sends you reminders. You just have to dodge a bunch of upsell offers. TurboTax lobbied the US government to prevent them from building a competing product, and in return they have to offer a free version. So in a way, TurboTax is our official state tax preparation system. Yay free-market?

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#144

Post by owenmarshall »

sargun wrote: post #51
harikb wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just that it is blank, it is expected that certain things that you fill match what they already know. It is more like a test, where you get nothing if you answer correctly and penalty if you make a mistake. Note: IRS does provide a way to download what they know as a pdf (what banks reported, for example), so one can get some help with the "test"

Where can you download that?

Make a good-faith error when you file your taxes. The IRS will send you a letter detailing what you did wrong per their records, your corrected taxes, and how to correct their records if you disagree.

That’s what happened to me when TurboTax applied too many credits.

That’s when I learned that the IRS had everything they needed to just send me a bill.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#145

Post by jpeeler »

jessehattabaugh wrote: post #143
vages wrote: post #15

Related fun (and sad) fact: In Norway, the tax submission forms are online and so user friendly that you don't need a tax filing program like this. Edit: Here is a link to an explanation for the form, in English, which was revamped in 2020: https://www.skatteetaten.no/en/person/taxes/tax-return/tax-r... The submission form is essentially a wizard that asks you questions related to your situation and your past year. D…

Truth is taxes in the US are pretty easy too; you just have to find TurboTax's free version which they hide. It downloads info from your financial institutions and employers, and asks you all the relevant questions. It remembers your info from year to year, and sends you reminders. You just have to dodge a bunch of upsell offers. TurboTax lobbied the US government to prevent them from building a competing product, an…

My understanding of the TurboTax free edition is that it doesn't support anything beyond basic income received from an employer. For those that don't really know the tax rules (including myself), are not the higher editions practically a requirement given they cover investing scenarios, house sales, etc...?

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#146

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

I like the code of conduct. If you can get a contibutor's guide and TODO list up, I'd bet you can get a couple contributors (especially around tax season). If it ends up covering a lot of the tax code in a few years, maybe the US Digital Service would consider hosting it.

I like that it's all browser-based, but the problem is that I, the user, have no way of actually guaranteeing it's not POSTing somewhere else. It's the same problem with browser JS crypto. So I would suggest that in addition to a note explaining how no personal data leaves their browser, also link to a guide on how to download and run it on a local computer. (Is it possible to export a single .html or .js file that a user can open with their browser? And a SHA512 checksum to verify the file?)

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#147

Post by rayiner »

kristopolous wrote: post #57
kuyan wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Broadly, a couple reasons: - Tax prep companies like Intuit have a vested interest in keeping tax prep difficult. - Grover Norquist (Americans for Tax Reform) believes that making filing taxes easier will make people more okay with paying taxes, and as a result, many conservative policymakers won't bite. (It's slightly more complicated than this, but I believe this assessment to be accurate.) Here's a Planet Money po…

The second one is new to me. It's really fascinating how they choose a set of policies and work hard to construct a reality that supports the policy positions. It strikes me as so backwards. It's tinfoil hat, but my only conclusion is the actual reasons for the policy are so incredibly unpopular that they invent these realities to obscure them.

How are they “constructing a reality?” How much taxes you pay is the reality. They’re trying to draw more attention to it, by forcing you to look the numbers in the face once a year. That’s not “constructing reality” it’s drawing attention to it.

I love paying my taxes and support higher taxes with more government services. But I agree with Norquist that it’s a useful exercise for people to go through once a year and write down how much they make and what part of that the government is taking. I don’t like the idea of socializing people to accept higher taxes by deducting them automatically and making it so they never have to think about how much they’re paying.

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#149

Post by sunnyam »

thanksforfish wrote: post #140

This is really cool, and I'd like to encourage work like this. I currently don't think I can recommend this to others because: It isn't immediately obvious who is running the site. whois info lists a Canadian privacy company. The site doesn't have an about page. Github has contributor info, which may help. Tax returns need to be private and accurate. If it's hard to verify that the authors are even in the US, it's ha…

It looks very easy to just build this from source, which is what privacy-concerned users would do anyway

Re: Show HN: ustaxes.org – open-source tax filing webapp

#150

Post by rayiner »

ajmadesc wrote: post #98
MuffinFlavored wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are other countries not victim to lobbying in the way America is? Is it just a double-edged sword that we have to thank for making us (one of) the economic powerhouse(s) of the world? At the same time, it feels like it to blame on why we can't have anything nice when compared to European countries. Am I out of line/uneducated on this matter? I very well could be. I hate just chalking the root of problems up to so…

American lobbying practices are criminal offences that would land you with corruption charges in Europe.

Can you give a concrete example?
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